


aren't you going to say hello?

by godlet



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Coercion, Dancing, Disabled Character of Color, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Nonbinary Character, Queerplatonic Relationships, Therapy, Unrequited Love, Yoga, danny bonding with ghosts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-09
Updated: 2016-05-09
Packaged: 2018-06-07 07:26:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6793684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/godlet/pseuds/godlet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ember's got her eye on Phantom...<br/>--<br/>It started with a gym membership. Then it turned into yoga every Thursday at 7. He just can't say no when the enigmatic (and cute) instructor invites him to dance lessons on Friday and Saturday as well.</p><p>Then it sort of snowballs without him realizing it, and Danny has to re-evaluate what his life is once he somehow gets strong-armed by Ember into joining her gig as a background dancer.</p><p>OR; Danny is a dancer and Phantom kind of suffers for it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. ember (loves you)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Biromantic_Nerd](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Biromantic_Nerd/gifts).



.

Being a stagnant ectoplasmic being whose powers came from the chanting of a particular name fueled by the hypnotized frenzy of an unwittingly supernatural crowd, it was no wonder that Ember McLain found it to be a herculean task passing between the Ghost Zone and the living world.

 

Still, she would complete the task a hundred times over if it meant getting access to a certain 'hero' hybrid boy in Amity Park.

 

"So then, like," Phantom gestured with one arm, sweeping a hand over the dark horizon of the cluttered and industrial Amity Park. "Half of this guy's foot is stuck inside my gut and the army of ghost weasels are coming straight for us like a pack of deranged Swiffer dusters – "

 

The two teen ghosts had something akin to friendship. Despite their admittedly rocky start ("Ember you brainwashed the entire town and tried to kill me several times." "Yea, so? It was a pretty _wicked_ couple of weeks back then." "…That's questionable.") and with the help of a couple of ghost shenanigans involving a bog and a plant monster (who was, surprisingly, not related to Undergrowth) and something dangerously close to a zombie apocalypse, the two had found out that they were pretty compatible in terms of conversation.

 

"- and so then this giant ass moose monster thing comes flying around the corner like it's the Animal Armageddon, which, um? How did I manage to piss off to many ghostly critters in such a short amount of time anyway?"

 

Most of the time, Ember would wait on top of an abandoned warehouse near the Lake Michigan docks for Phantom to either finish with his patrol that night or to get bored and wander the streets like some sort of melodramatic protagonist searching for incentive to turn to the dark side. Then they'd sit on the edge and just… talk the night away. Sometimes Phantom would even "de-transform" and lounge around as a human.

 

"- and _then,_ hoo boy, I stick that _blowhard_ up in one of those weird gnarly looking trees that sit on top of those random floating rocks so that he wouldn't get anymore bright ideas. My plan was to go back and get him later, you know? Because apparently he has _zero_ self-preservation skills – "

 

To be quite honest, Ember didn't know _what_ to think when Phantom first voluntarily de-transformed in front of her. Usually he only did that when he was beaten in battle (not often anymore) or hadn't a need to transform yet that day. He'd even started bringing food with him at random points ("What? I missed dinner; don't give me that face." "You eat _ectoplasm_ for dinner? I thought humans eat, like, _not_ ectoplasm." "Oh, nah, it's spaghetti. This is just what my mom's cooking looks like.") and eating it like they hadn't literally been at each other's throats not but a few months ago.

 

" – that little rat bastard, I swear to – I'm gonna go on a tangent, okay? Lemme just rant at you about Wesley _fucking_ Weston for a moment here – "

 

Imagine her surprise when Phantom starts crying about _binders_ of all things one night, and how hard it was to live with the constant pressure on his injuries sometimes. She had immediately latched onto that conversation, calming the distraught and overworked hybrid with her own hazily recalled binder stories. ("I got – my sister bought me new GC2B binders this weekend – " "GC2B? I don't remember that brand…" "…Maybe you're older than we thought?" "…Maybe.") She can't remember the exact details of her life, or why her manifesting form is what it is, but she could still vaguely remember the hardships of living as a gender non-conforming human.

 

"Anyway, long story short, I blame _Plasmius_ for kicking every single puppy on the earth. Even the ghost ones." Phantom finished his story with, slapping a palm down onto the concrete edge of the building and giving Ember a tired and harried look. "Everything ever is his fault and nothing can convince me otherwise."

 

Ember met those big, blue eyes with her own unwavering pair. She didn't blink as she took in the visage of the human boy, his stupid little hoodie with the very brash embroidered **DP** on the front stood out like a glow-in-the-dark smear in the oppressive night of the abandoned dock.

 

"You've been quiet for a while now," Phantom commented, "something wrong? Ember?"

 

Ember's flame practically roared with euphoria at the sound of her name. She had to metaphorically clamp down on the urge to let this power show by revving up the flames on her head, instead propping her hand up under her chin and reaching out one arm to the boy's black mop.

 

"You know, baby-pop," Ember began with, almost hesitantly, as she rubbed the fuzzy hair on top of his warm, human head. He let her touch him so willingly, casually, and with so much more trust than she could ever hope for that her heart soared. "You really are – "

 

The very loud and interrupting sound of a phone going off startled them both, Phantom pulling away to stand at the edge of the building, holding the device out and making a face at the screen before hovering the phone in the general direction his ear.

 

"Um, yea - ?" Phantom made another face as a loud _'Where the fuck are you Danny!?'_ fuzzed through the speaker.

 

Outwardly, Ember snickered. Inwardly, she seethed and reeled and tried to right herself again. What had she almost done? Confessed like some kind of love-stuck teenager sneaking out behind parents' backs for a little fore yay at the docks?

 

Acted like a _human?_ A human with even the barest hint of a _chance?_

 

"Mmmmm," Phantom made a noise of distress as the call ended. "I better go. Sam's getting all naggy since I keep disappearing right in the middle of patrols and then never showing up at the rendezvous point." He shrugged like it wasn't his fault, turning towards the still sitting Ember with a disappointed look. "So, um… See you soon?"

 

"Wait." She spoke before she thought.

 

Phantom made the most adorable humming sound, twirling steadily on his feet despite being several stories above concrete.

 

Ember felt the need to lick her lips, or shuffle, or exhibit some sort of still inherent human behavior that she almost punched herself in the face. "Say my name. Before you go."

 

After a few moments of silence, Phantom had a very interesting flow of emotions on his face. First it was confusion, then shock, then fear, and then revelation and understanding.

 

"Oh, yea," he said, stepping forward to stand right over top of her. "Guess you need that, huh? Ember."

 

Ember preened, letting her hair flare just the smallest amount despite the massive amounts of energy it actually gave her.

 

"You know?" Phantom told her with a wry little smile that would've made a human heart stutter. "It's not fair how you can mess up my hair, but I can't mess up yours."

 

Ember snorted, "Be my guest, baby."

 

"I can't!" He complained, laughing a little as his smile grew. "I'd light my hand on fire."

 

"Sucks to be you," she responded with, mock derision in her tone as she flipped her fiery hair over one shoulder.

 

Unfortunately, this caused it to hit the back of Phantom's knee, felling him with a tiny shout of surprise at the sudden heat on his leg.

 

With some sort of instinct she didn't even think she still had, Ember's arms shot out to catch the hybrid boy before he fell any lower than her knees. One hand wound behind his upper back, the other on his lower, placing him in the perfect position to be dipped… several hundred feet above the ground.

 

"Whoa!" Phantom tittered nervously, shaking slightly in her cold iron grip. "That was uh… that was close." He swallowed once, eyes flicking to the ground before meeting hers. "Thanks, Ember."

 

Inside, Ember was at war. If she were still alive, she was sure that her mind would be urging her to kiss him, to hold him closer, to do something undeniably _physical_ and _affectionate_ and _telling._

 

However, she was (unfortunately) not alive. Not anymore. So her mind didn't know what to do. It crowed and itched and burned to do _something._ Something that she couldn't identify. She didn't know if she wanted to pull him closer or rip out his throat and drink his core into hers indefinitely or _what._

 

The longer she stared, pupil-less green eyes dark and swirling and _hungry,_ the redder Phantom became. His freckles stood out like twinkling stars on his skin burning skin.

 

She fixated on that. Red. There were precious few red characteristics in the Ghost Zone. Red was the color of life; the color of blood, of organs, of orifices and heated skin from a flushed cheek to a feverish wound.

 

Ember wasn't red. She hadn't been red for such a long time that she'd nearly forgotten that she had been red at all. Was she really a sixteen-year-old vocalist, guitarist, and song-writer holding a fourteen-year-old dream boat of a mess? Or was she a dimensional, blasphemous, ectoplasmic manifestation of what she convinced her bitter, dying self she was?

 

"Careful, baby-pop," Ember said. It had a hollow quality to it, no doubt. "Wouldn't want that squishy body of yours to get hurt, would we?"

 

Instead of giving the human-ghost hybrid a chance to speak, Ember slid off of the side of the building and slowly floated her way down, carrying a slightly star struck and entirely confused Phantom the whole way.

 

She wanted to be cool, and look straight forward, never catching his wide eyes as they landed, but she just couldn't. She wanted to act aloof and tease and mock him for being such a 'princess.' Maybe she could have even emulated her inner Skulker and warned him not to let his guard down around her so often, lest she snap him up as her prisoner.

 

"Uh, um…" Phantom shifted awkwardly, Ember's arms still around his shoulders despite the fact that he was already standing on the ground. "Thanks? Ember?"

 

Ember hummed deep in her throat, eyelids fluttering, as her fiery hair curled up and around her head. Her eyes were like hot coals in the darkness between buildings, boring into the young hybrid's with an intensity that hadn't even been shown in battle before.

 

"Go home, baby," Ember told him, releasing his shoulders and floating into the air with a rapidly disappearing body in a very obvious show of retreat. "And don't bother looking for me for a while. I'll be busy."

 

Phantom stood, awkward and feeling oddly empty, staring up at the smoggy sky with a small amount of apprehension and… disappointment?

 

Feeling for all in the world like he just missed something – something incredibly important – Phantom began his very slow and very human trek home.

.


	2. chance at

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *talk of therapy, medication, chronic pain, institutionalized ableism

.

For some terribly inconvenient reason that probably has something to do with science and karma, half-dying in a portal between two dimensions does not automatically mean getting a ripped bod with super strength and endurance.

 

As agile and full of tenacious self-sacrificing behavior as Danny could be, his five years of being a ghost-fighting, butt-kicking halfa gave him more of an injured, tired disposition than a heroic one. There was just something about being thrown around by ectoplasmic manifestations of dead beings and concepts that looked like they came out of a Lovecraftian horror that does a guy in.

 

Which is exactly why he doesn't put up very much of a fight when Sam wires him the funds to buy a gym membership.

 

"It'll be good for you, bucko," Sam's voice fuzzes over the speakers of the laptop. Danny is sitting in the desolate corner of a sad café, sipping at a mediocre coffee and generally enjoying existing as a perfectly normal human being.

 

Which, according to everyone in the small town on the good side of Kentucky he's decided to settle in (for now), he was. A spry young man with 'a way with the other world', as they call him. The only people who ever give him a second glance are wanting buyers or previous clients wishing him well on his questionable journey as a traveling 'medium.'

 

At some point in his half-dead life, Danny decided to try some very private therapy and a bit (actually, a lot) of anxiety medication. It didn't exactly work wonders, but it did manage to get him up and on his feet in time to graduate high school and steer _very_ clear of anything college related. Which is why Sam is face-timing him from somewhere in Germany, and Tucker probably won't have access to reliable internet until he hits a certain spot in Argentina.

 

Nobody will honestly tell him _why_ Tucker is in Argentina. It is what it is.

 

What Danny did with this sudden gaping hole of friendship and lack of brain chemicals trying to rip his mind apart every time he was conscious for more than an hour a day was start up what was, essentially, a ghost network.

 

If he couldn't keep the ghosts in the Zone without beating them up, then so be it. He just said 'fuck it' one day and let some very confused ex-enemies through the portal with a shake of the hand, a disarming smile, and a "Let's make a deal."

 

He was incredibly sure that Clockwork and those nosy Observants would approve, even if they'd never admit it.

 

It, to his friend's and family's upmost surprise, went swimmingly. Especially when Walker got involved and stationed their guards at commonly spawning natural portal sites, leaving their best and most powerful sentries at the Fenton Portal.

 

Vlad's portal has yet to be rebuilt, and as far as Danny is concerned, it was going to stay that way.

 

But things weren't all just suddenly purple prose and roses with convenient discussions planned with every amicable and thankful ghost in the Zone.

 

There were still quite a few close calls when a half-formed goon of Walker's would zoom to Danny with final words of an attack on Amity Park, melting into the ground as their core disintegrated and the half-ghost is forced to abandon whatever niche he'd built for himself in order to return home for one more tussle with a big baddie.

 

Danny takes another sip of his coffee and closes out of the program used to contact his friends. Instead, he opens the web browser to pull up a specific collection of world news sites. When nothing immediately distressing pops out (you'd be surprised how often ghost attacks can be on the front page as anything _but_ ghost attacks) he settles back into his mind for some peace and dreggy coffee.

 

With that last 'big showdown' in Amity Park, his parents were thrown out of commission. Despite not being that old, all the ecto-radiation they'd exposed themselves to over their life had worn them down. They'd left the FentonWorks Inventions home to their son in full trust of his abilities as a half-ghost protector and moved on to do some paranormal hunting in other parts of the states.

 

What with his friends on other corners of the planet (despite him being able to fly there in a few hours flat) and his parents settling down as simple detectives somewhere in New York (for the time being – they were thinking about scouting out Oregon next), Danny had a lot of space to work with.

 

The first was turning FentonWorks into a ghost communication hub, courtesy of the immensely apologetic and ass-kissing section of government that previously funded the Guys in White. What used to be his childhood home (an entire block, because stuff gets messy often enough to warrant the sprawling takeover) now resides as an in-between for ghosts that want to gain access to the living world through a modified ghost shield operated by trusted gatekeepers.

 

 _Speak of the devil…_ Danny thinks as he clicks on an intriguing news article. Ember McLain is broadcasting her new album's top songs tonight at a concert in Nevada. He scrolls down some more, bemused, until he comes across the line " – and she dedicates this song to a mysterious young fellow named _'Phantom',_ who has yet to be _– "_

 

Danny nearly shoots coffee out of his nose, face red, as he closes out of the web browser with a few harried fumbles of the hand.

 

Nobody but the _entire freaking_ Ghost Zone (salty, still) and his family/friends knows that he was and is Phantom. Hell; the world seems a bit blind to how many ghosts are coming in and out of the Zone daily, especially with ones like Ember who take to masquerading as humans.

 

The nineteen-year-old ghost-boy wonders how the world will look five years from now. Will ghosts be accepted as entities just as entitled to their existence as the living beings they once used to be?

 

His surprisingly introspective musings are interrupted by a notification pinging on his phone. He tries not to groan aloud as he packs up his things and heads towards the only gym he could locate on such short notice.

 

Time to get buff – or whatever. He's not that picky when it comes to having a physical body not made of ectoplasm.

.

* * *

.

Danny stands, awkward, tiny, and lank in the middle of a semi-crowded public gym. He pretends to know what he's doing by setting his stuff down next to a mat and beginning a stretch routine he surprisingly still remembers from his godawful high school experience.

 

 _Nobody's looking at you,_ the young half-ghost tries to reassure himself as he struggles with touching his toes. He might pull off some pretty flexible moves as Phantom, but as Danny he was about as limber as a tree.

 

_Probably has something to do with how when you're made of ectoplasm, you don't exactly have muscles to stretch or be hindered by…_

 

Danny startles and nearly gives himself a back cramp when someone roughly sets their own stuff down not but a few mats away, twisting their torso around a few times before practically shoving their own head between their legs in a show of godless flexibility.

 

He can't help it. He abandons his half-hearted task of stretching in favor of dropping his jaw and openly staring at this mysteriously long person with awe and hints of jealousy. It makes him, once again, feel like he's in high school, only gayer this time.

 

"Can I help you?"

 

Danny squeaks, legs and arms curling in on himself so quickly that he accidentally lightly punches himself in the mouth. Unfortunately, 'lightly' for him is the equivalent of a jet plane colliding with a hapless bird, so his mouth almost immediately starts bleeding via a cut from his teeth.

 

His poor, aching teeth.

 

"Jesus Christ." The person snaps up from their position and hurries forward, crouching in front of Danny with a clean rag they pull out of their pocket. "So sorry, man, didn't think I'd scare you that much. _Ow,_ that looks bad… Are you okay?"

 

"Uh… I'm fine…" Danny mumbles out awkwardly as he takes the clean rag and dirties it with his halfa blood. He's one of those people that actually get red when their skin heats up, so he doesn't doubt that he might look like a fresh beet right now. "Sorry…"

 

"Mm," they wave a hand dismissively. "No problem."

 

There's a bout of awkward silence. Danny wants to go die in a hole.

 

"So…" They begin. Danny wishes that hole would hurry up. "Why were you uh… staring?"

 

Danny flaps his open hand next to his legs before realizing what he's doing and stops, "I uhm! I – You're so… stretchy?" _Oh, my god,_ "And I'm… not?"

 

"Oh, yeah, I uh," they scratch the back of their head. It's sort of ruined since they have the hood of their sleeveless vest up. "I do yoga here every Wednesday and Thursday. Really relaxing, you know…" They sort of trail off when they get a look at Danny's face.

 

" _Yoga,"_ Danny hisses. He's probably imitating a complete and total serpent, but he has got a fucking _bone_ to pick with yoga. "It'll be a cold day in hell when people stop telling me to do _yoga."_

 

"I..." They take a glance around the room before demoting their crouch to a cross-leg sit, leaning close to Danny to covertly say "I know, right? As if doing yoga and eating salads every day is going to magically disappear my mental illness and chronic pain. And it's always from those really, obviously not in-constant-pain people that tell me to do it, too. Ha!"

 

Angels sing as the lights of the establishment zero in on the mysterious and dark-clad figure sitting next to Danny.

 

His savior.

 

After years without professional or medical help in high school when the most common bit of advice from do-gooder-totally-not-mentally-ill people was 'why don't you go outside more?' or 'why don't you eat healthier?' or – brace yourselves, here – 'why don't you try _yoga?'_

 

In those days, murder seemed like a few steps away around every corner.

 

"So…" Danny says quietly, also flicking his eyes from side to side like the two of them were in a covert situation. "Tell me more about… yoga?"

 

The other person's mouth stretches thin and wide in an excited grin.

.

* * *

.

Danny goes to his shabby little apartment next to a corn field (those are everywhere here) and tells Sam all about a certain person named Flower who he is going to be attending yoga with every Thursday at 7 a.m.

 

"See!" She crows. Someone tosses a live chicken painted bright green behind her on the screen. Danny elects to ignore it. "Told you it'd be good for you. Making 'friends' on the first day, huh, _Casanova?"_

 

Danny can't help the heat that comes to his face. He sticks a cold and clammy hand to his cheek to try and stifle it, but from Sam's manic grin, it probably doesn't work. "Mmmmaybe." He sniffs once. "Don't call me that. I literally just met them! And nothing happened, you perv."

 

"Oh, yeah?" She chuckles darkly. "Well, what do they look like?"

 

"I come up to their chest," he immediately begins absentmindedly as he fiddles with an ecto-signature gadget next to his elbow. Can't be too careful these days… "They wore a hood so I couldn't see their eyes, but they were honestly buff as fuck. Had some really nice skin, was olive… Wonder why their name is Flower – Hey! Why are you laughing?"

 

Sam doesn't bother to hide her gaping mouth behind her hand or anything polite like that. She just let's a raucous laugh rip. Someone in the room with her also starts laughing like the mere thought of something funny could get them going. "Nothing! You're just so oblivious – it brings me joy."

 

Danny rolls his eyes. "Whatever, Sammy."

 

"Don't test me, pretty boy."

 

'Pretty boy' visibly cringes as a chorus of _'ooooooh snap!'_ s ring from Sam's side. She looks incredibly smug.

 

"Don't make me fly all the way over there and throw down," Danny grumbles out. Thankfully, everyone on Sam's side apparently assume that he means flight by plane and not by supernatural means.

 

"Whatever, pretty boy," Sam says with a startlingly white, toothy grin. She must be really happy to talk to him today. "You better get ready for yoga tomorrow morning, then."

 

Danny practically flings his gadget across the room, narrowly forgetting that he also had magnifying goggles strapped to his head. God, he must look like such a dork to the people on the other side of the camera. No wonder they laugh at him along with Sam. "Uhh… Tomorrow's Thursday? When did that happen?"

 

Sam just laughs and closes out of the program, leaving a confused half-ghost blinking owlishly in her wake.

 

 _I don't know why I ever expect her to be anything other than a jerk,_ he mentally sighs.

.

* * *

.

The first thing that Danny does when he arrives at where the yoga class is supposed to be held is get very, very lost.

 

The next thing he does is realize that he has no idea how 'yoga' actually goes.

 

"It's fine," says Flower, who is now in a bright yellow hoodie vest. Danny wonders if he will ever see the top half of their face. "You can borrow one of my mats. Since this is your first time you're required to be in the front row."

 

 _Oh, man,_ the anxiety-filled part of Danny whimpers. Good thing he took his medication before he came or else this would probably be the part where he would wheeze and throw himself out the nearest window to escape.

 

He trails like a puppy after Flower past a few rows of people chatting and setting out droll colored mats. Everyone looks like they have at least one buddy, making Danny feel even more isolated and prickly with nerves. The kind that start in the stomach and spider out like thin fingers until every part of the body is tingly in the bad way.

 

Flower expertly unfolds a mat in the front center ( _I'm dead,_ Danny's mind says, _this is how I die the rest of the way_ ) and… continues walking forward to set up their own mat at the very front of the room on the platform?

 

What?

 

"What?" Danny accidentally says out loud, then smacks a hand over his mouth when he gets an odd look from the unknown person to his right.

 

"Oh, yea," Flower says casually as they wave an absent hand, "did I mention that I'm the instructor? Because I am."

 

Danny really, really feels like tossing himself off the nearest cliff would be the most fabulous thing right now.

.

* * *

.

"So…" Sam draws out, plucking at a weird green thing in front of her on a plate with her fingers. Danny can't tell if it was what she was going to eat or something else entirely. "How was your first yoga class?"

 

"Awful," and then, "I loved it." Danny brushes a heavy hand through his fringe, propping his head up on his floating arm. He can do that because Sam is alone this time in her video call. "Flower _somehow forgot_ to mention that they were the instructor of the class, so, uh, that went well."

 

Sam appears to actually be holding back derisive laughter this time, which is weird and unnecessary because Danny sort of feels like laughing at himself right now, too.

 

"That must've uh…" She clears her throat and adjusts herself in her seat. "But you said you loved it, right? How bad could it be to keep going?"

 

"Yea," Danny breathes out, throwing his shoulders up in a reluctant shrug that's sort of ruined when he spins slightly in the air. "I _guess."_

 

"You should," she hums mischievously. Danny narrows his eyes and is immediately suspicious. "Given that they practically straight up asked you out on a _da – "_

 

Danny shuts the laptop with much too much force, accidentally tossing himself halfway out the window before he floats his way back into his apartment.

 

 _Great,_ Danny thinks sarcastically as his stomach squirms pleasantly at the thought of going to the gym again _, just… perfect._

 

A cow screams dramatically in the near distance. Danny feels the need to sarcastically scream back.

.

* * *

.

"I promise you, Mr. Nagatoshi," Danny reassures the aging optometrist with a nervous scratch at the back of his head and a small smile born of the fear of failure. "There are no more paranormal entities in your house, your basement, your attic, _or_ your shed. It has all been taken care of."

 

With that, he accepts the payment (albeit reluctantly – old folk tend to overpay to a certain extent that his guilty little heart just couldn't handle) and books it to the nearest abandoned patch of woods to transform and get his skinny ass over to the gym.

 

He was late for yoga.

 

He's been going to Flower's yoga class every Thursday for the past month. He was starting to become a staple business in the medium-sized Kentucky town he is still settled in. It was actually quite dangerous, given the mysterious and numerous enemies he'd gained over the years, but…

 

Well, as Sam puts it; he's been struck with a really awful crush that he just can't shake yet.

 

"It's not a crush," he mumbles cattily to himself as he transforms back to human in an alley just outside the gym. He draws up short of bursting through the doors when he sees… most of the yoga class already filing out.

 

"Aw, nuts," Danny huffs. He's so late that he missed it!

 

"Danny?" Flower walks up to him with a mat under their arm and their phone open. "Hey, uh… Didn't know if you were coming today?" They give a pointed look (which is hard to tell given Danny can't even see their eyes) to Danny's outfit.

 

 _Oh, right, we're still wearing_ trash _suited for running around and getting ectoplasm on._ "I had a client," Danny blurts out, "sorry, really sorry, didn't even think to call and warn you that my job is really… fickle." _More like ghosts are complete assholes who never listen to reason and get beat up for it._

 

"Mm," Flower hums, shoving their phone into their hoodie pocket. Today they are wearing purple. Danny totally doesn't notice, totally. "Tell you what. There's a dance class here every Friday and Saturday evening at 6 p.m. It costs actual money to go to, but I can get you in for free for a first time?"

 

Danny says "Do you turn out to be the instructor of this one, too?" before he can get a hold of himself. He feels his face heat up in mortification.

 

_My brain: 0_

 

_My mouth: 10000_

 

_Awesome._

 

Thankfully, Flowers gives a startled laugh. "N-no, no; unfortunately, my expertise only lies within swan arms and downward dog. The instructor, though, she's a friend of mine who doesn't mind if I bring in new bodies to mold for a first time go."

 

Five minutes later, Danny walks away barely believing it.

 

Looks like he's going to dance class tomorrow, then.

.

* * *

.

On a sliding scale of 'best worst thing to ever happen to him', dance class was at a solid 9. Yoga followed after that at a 7 with the gym membership coming up weak in comparison at a 5.

 

"I am Fen," the tall, tall, _tall_ woman speaks down at Danny. She doesn't offer her hand or anything, so neither does he. "Welcome to 'dance class.'"

 

 _Flower what have you done to me,_ Danny's mind mutters with a touch of death as it notices a distinct lack of the hood-wearing yoga instructor.

 

It also notices the distinct presence of metal dancing poles and a room surrounded with mirrors.

 

He really, really hopes no one tries to get him to use those today.

 

"Lesson begins in five minutes!" Fen calls to the rest of the class. They are all mostly tall, beefy people with steely dispositions, though there are a few 'little guys' not including Danny. The big difference between him and them is that none of them look ready to quite literally turn invisible and get the heck out of there.

 

Ten minutes in and Fen accosts him.

 

"You are struggling." Is all she says, crossing her big arms and staring down at him. "Why?"

 

 _If I ever met a real life Thor, this would be them,_ Danny's traitorous mind quips before it boots back online. "Uh, er, well…" He shrugs sort of helplessly. "First time?"

 

Her eyes sort of widen and her arms drop. "I nearly forgot… You are Flower's student, yes?" He nods slightly. "You should have told me. Come along, now."

 

And then she does something really weird that makes it nearly impossible for Danny to run screaming from this mortal plane when she grabs his upper arm with one surprisingly soft hand and drags him to the front of the room.

 

_Oh, gee, great! The front of the room. Again._

 

Something weeps and collapses in his mind as he is poked and prodded into proper position for a very long dance session with Lady Thor and all of her devil incarnate subordinates who were surprisingly okay with him stepping on their feet.

.

* * *

.

"That's exaggerating," Sam tells him decisively, if not with a bit of jealousy in her voice. "You're so full of shit, Danny-boy. You did not dance with Thor and then get passed around a room full of devils like a hot potato. Come on, that – "

 

"Totally happened, I swear to god," Danny groans out, not bothering to take his hand off from over his eyes. He could still feel the embarrassment and mortification from doing all of the wrong moves and generally making a fool of himself for two hours straight last night. "It was the most terrifying thing I've ever experienced and I have _literally experienced death,_ Sam."

 

"So I heard somebody's dating again?"

 

A gasp. "Tucker!" And then "What the hell are you doing on Sam's side of the camera? When did you get back? Why didn't you contact me first – "

 

"Slow your roll, ghost-boy," Tucker announces as he walks into view – shirtless and with a white towel around his dripping neck. Something in Danny's throat tightens. "And no matter how much I like watching you spiral into a hot mess over every little thing in your life, I had a bit of training I needed to do." He shrugs. "Sam was just closer by the time I got done."

 

"Tuk, Sam is all the way in Germany," Danny points out. "You were in Argentina. Technically, Kentucky is easier to get to since you don't have to cross water."

 

Tucker and Sam share a look. "Who told you I was in Argentina?"

 

Danny's brain fizzles to a halt. "Um… _You_ … did?"

 

"Danny," Sam cuts in, brows furrowed like she can't believe what he's saying. "He said Algeria, not Argentina."

 

Danny takes the time to lean back in his seat and stare at the ceiling.

 

"I'm so fucked up," he tells them eventually. "Why is my life such a beautiful _lie."_

 

A barely audible snort. "Maybe Flower and Thor can help him _massage_ it out – "

 

"And you!" Danny crows suddenly, snapping back up so hard that the sore muscles in his body complain. "What the hell are _those!?"_ He jabs a finger at the screen, nearly forgetting that the other two can't exactly see that very well. "Your arms – your chest – your _everything,_ Tuk! You've _both_ been getting buff and now you're both passive aggressively pressuring _me_ into getting buff." He huffs, "For shame. To think I could blame every single current problem of mine on your all's fricking _leg days."_

 

Sam sputters out a laugh as Tuk only takes a few seconds to blink at the screen before flexing mockingly, his white towel sliding to the floor. "Well – when you look like us, why _wouldn't_ you wanna 'get buff'?"

 

"Speaking of," Sam cuts in, forcefully shoving a laughing Tucker out of shot. "Don't you have dance class again tonight? Are you gonna go?" She doesn't even wait for a response before putting her two cents in. "I think you should go."

 

"Man, I dunno," Danny sighs indecisively, unconsciously beginning to float up from his seat. Several other things begin to float off of his desk, causing him to absentmindedly pat them back down to succumb to gravity's wiles. He pretends not to hear Sam and Tuk's snickering. "It was really embarrassing, but… kind of fun? Like when you go down a really big waterslide and you feel like death is near but then you get out and it's kind of okay again?"

 

"That's the spirit!" Sam crows. Her and Tuk are having a small arm-wrestling competition. What's surprising is that Sam is actually struggling for once.

 

Danny rolls his eyes, adding "Actually, I'm pretty sure that's adrenaline," as he takes a gander at the clock on his laptop. He has six hours until dance class. He swallows a bit of stress-induced bile and decides to make the most of them by egging his friends on.

 

"Bet Sam can't beat Tuk in a wrestling competition anymore."

 

"Oh, you're on, pretty boy!"

 

"Danny _nooo,_ you traitor!"

 

Danny smirks quite evilly as chaos erupts on the other side of the screen in the form of Sam bodily tackling a screaming Tucker to the ground.

 

_Justice will prevail._

.

* * *

.

Danny has to resist the urge to suplex the attractive motherfucker and get it over with.

 

 _Violence solves nothing,_ a voice sounding suspiciously like Jazz's tells him.

 

"So, like," Danny drawls a bit cattily, tapping one finger in the outside of his folded arms to try and hide tension. "Was it your intention to throw me to the wolves last week? Because you did."

 

Flower, to their credit, does look at least slightly sheepish. "I may forget to say some things in the middle of conversation."

 

Danny holds back the bitter 'ya think?' that wants to come spitting out. This was his yoga instructor, for shit's sakes. He doesn't need to throw down and establish his anxiety dominance over the seemingly chill individual.

 

"For what it's worth," Flower says, "I _am_ sorry that I forgot to tell you that I don't take that class. It's a bit too rough on the joints for me to participate."

 

_Awesome, now I feel like a total jerk._

 

"I-it's fine," Danny breathes out, scratching the back of his head and rocking back on his heels as his psych deflates with guilt. "Well, I'll let you get on with the whole yoga-teaching thing."

 

With an amicable wave that was somewhat awkward, Danny takes a few steps back until he's on top of his mat at the front of the room. He feels a certain empathy with the obviously anxious new person situated next to him on the left, so he gives them a little nod and a too-quiet "'sup."

 

He tries not to think about how he was going to have to dance all over again tomorrow and the day after as he shoves his head between his legs and easily stretches.

.

* * *

.

He gets jumped Saturday night in an alley outside the gym right before he can transform and fly home.

 

The palm strike he directs upwards towards the chin of his enemy is deflected by a casual wave of the hand that soon comes down to capture his limbs. Before he knows it, he's being dipped backwards so far his vertebrae are crackling and his hair is brushing the cement.

 

"Nice to see you too, baby-pop."

 

" _Ember!?"_ Danny gasps as he's snapped back upwards, coming face-to-chest ( _whoa_ ) with the ghostly popstar in all her glowing blue glory. "What the heck are _you_ doing here!?"

 

She pops some green gum in his face. He can't tell if it's ectoplasmic or just spearmint. "Looking for you – _duh."_

 

With that, she begins to spin him in a move reminiscent of his earlier, softer dance classes. His feet instinctively take him through the steps that he's done so many times before in these past few months.

 

"You're pretty good, huh, baby?" Ember chuckles, sending a wave of eldritch air over his face. It's definitely not normal gum, then.

 

"No, seriously," Danny repeats, trying and failing to lightly tug himself away. Instead he settles for a huff, letting Ember slowly float them up towards the top of a nearby building so that no one would look out their window and see two glowing figures twirling around in the air. "What are you doing here? And why would you be looking for me? Is _something wro – "_

 

"Pfft," Ember waves a hand, momentarily dropping Danny a few inches. He transforms to make up for it, a slight flash of light and a diffusing of pressure the telling signs of the half-dead wonder. "The only thing wrong with this situation is that _Grandad Walker_ has yet to see that fabulous video of you strutting your stuff on a pole."

 

Danny sucks in a breath and promptly chokes on it, falling to the roof of the building as Ember lands heavily next to him slapping her knee and laughing.

 

" _What!?"_ The ghost-boy shrieks, flying up and into Ember's personal space. In the face of the powerful halfa, however, she only laughs louder. "Who took – when did you – why – _what!?"_

 

It was true. Danny's class had moved on to pole dancing not but a week ago. What's even worse is that Danny is quite good at pole, especially with how flexible yoga has made him recently.

 

And, apparently, someone ( _probably the_ hyena _right here_ ) took a secret video of one of his many practice sessions.

 

It's not like pole dancing was inherently sexual or depraved or something. He just can't deny it when his face heats up with total and utter embarrassment.

 

Plus, Walker was kind of an old-timey stickler for rules. Danny could barely escape a lecture on responsibilities when the southern ghost got their pale hands on him when he visits Amity Park.

 

Before he can scream himself hoarse, Ember is flipping a stylish phone out and in front of his face, her finger already poised over the play button. Danny can see what appears to be a very familiar mirrored room as the thumbnail.

 

 _Oh no_ , his mind whispers incredibly unhelpfully and with a whole heaping of _oh shit_ on the side.

 

" _One,"_ Danny bites out dangerously, energy crackling in the air around him as the roof becomes lightly frosted beneath their feet. "I have no idea why you were stalking me. _Two,"_ he breathes out. _Do not duke it out in a sleepy bumpkin town do not duke it out in the sleepy bumpkin town do not duke it out –_ "What do you want?"

 

"What do _I_ want?" Ember repeats mockingly, apparently not even going to touch on the first point he made. "Well, if baby-pop doesn't want a stick-in-the-mud like Walker to find this here _incriminating evidence_ of his 'inability to make rational decisions while representing the Zone' _,"_ she pops another luminescent bubble as she recites a very familiar quote to the rapidly paling Phantom, "then he's going to have to do me a _biiig_ favor."

 

_Translation: Walker is literally the fun police you were warned about._

 

Danny pretends that he did not just swallow nervously as he gazes at the ghostly popstar with eyes full of acid and death.

 

He also pretends that he doesn't immediately regret his heavy "What do you have in mind," when all Ember responds with is a huge shark-like grin.

 

Uh-oh.

.

* * *

.

"I could skip town," Danny reasons with himself as he paces around the small floor space in his apartment. "Other places have got to have attractive yoga instructors that I can latch on to, too, right?"

 

All around him, various ecto-energy fueled gadgets are floating in the air with lightly green glowing sides. A few of the items on the floor even have a dusting of frost on them.

 

Obviously, he is conflicted.

 

And he doesn't stop being conflicted even when he waves a hand, messily magicing a wayward mug to slam quite noisily ( _owch_ ) into his laptop mouse to answer the call currently ringing on his computer screen.

 

"'Sup," Tucker pops up with before his eyebrows furrow and he visibly backtracks on what he was about to say. "What's wrong with you?"

 

"Oh, nothing," Danny replies a bit snappily. His feet are no longer touching the carpet as he continues to do derby circles. "Just thinking 'what in the fresh hell is happening in my life?' because obviously _it's all downhill from here."_

 

"Whoa – okay." Tucker clears his throat a bit awkwardly. Years of being Danny's friend has taught him well. "Well, me and Sam are about to get on our flight. We just wanted to tell you that we're going to be in Nevada for the Ember concert." He makes a noise of excitement. "Can you believe that Ember mailed us _free tickets_ the other day? Wonder why – "

 

"I'm sure she has her perfectly _bullshit_ reasons as to why." Can you tell that he's bitter? Because he's very, very bitter.

 

"Don't be a smartass!" Sam's voice calls from somewhere unseen. Tucker only quirks an eyebrow and refuses to intervene.

 

"No, of course not. Out of the question." The floating ghost-boy replies sarcastically.

 

"So, uh…" Tucker makes more nervous movements, but is generally accepting as his fate of being the only purely rational person in the three-way friendship. "Did she give you tickets, too?"

 

Danny makes a nervous, angry sound in his throat. "You know what? I'll be there." He sighs gustily, lightly landing on the floor. In a telling gesture, he has to forcefully lower everything floating himself. "Just… look for me while you're there, okay? And don't wait up."

 

"Hmm," Tucker hums with narrowed eyes. "Alright, I guess – "

 

A loud bang comes from the background of his screen, the black teen turning around with an incredulous and resigned face as Sam can be heard cussing up a storm and clattering more objects around.

 

Danny only sighs and closes his laptop before his friends could drag him into whatever shenanigans they inevitably would get into during the simple transition between states.

 

He feels exactly zero emotions when his alarm clock drifts out his open window and into the great cornfield beyond.

.

* * *

.

When he realizes that he has to actually, physically, face-to-face say goodbye to his yoga instructor of the past three months and dance instructor of the past two months, he pulls a Sam Manson and cusses up an emotional and rage-filled storm.

 

Still, he resigns to his fate as the schlemiel of the world and ends up catching both Flower and Fen (AKA "Lady Thor") at the gym. Because fuck his luck.

 

Flower and he exchange numbers in an awkward but thoughtful bout of affection of being similar people who suffer from illnesses that require medication, whether mental or physical, and the tall non-binary person bids him farewell as they hurry off, five minutes late, to their yoga class.

 

"U-um…" Danny belatedly raises and arm to halt Fen from leaving to cancel his weekly dance class payment. He awkwardly (as usual) pretends to wrap that arm around the back of his head before he can touch her. "I can uh… I can set up some kind of g-ghost repellant for your studio? If you… want?"

 

She gives him a look that could only ever be described as 'weird.'

 

"I-I mean!" Danny waves his hands around to try and clear the metaphorical air. "Just so that a ghost doesn't… come in and… record…" He sighs and slaps a hand to his face. "You know what? Never mind. I appreciated your class and learned a lot. Bye."

 

Then he promptly fucks off to an alley between buildings to press his forehead tightly to a brick wall and hiss silently in mortification before transforming and invisibly flying back to his bare apartment to finish shoving all of his shit into Ember's lair in the Ghost Zone courtesy of a sheepishly clawed portal from Wulf.

 

Because she's the conniving shithead who forced him into this. She'll just have to live with all of his suitcases clogging up her cross-dimensional studio for a while.

.

* * *

.

The sounds of many pattering, sharp, rushing feet and a few whispering gusts of not-so-normal passings hiss into the surrounding ambience clogged with what may be a crowd of thousands of people on the other side of the heavy blue curtain.

 

And Danny is breaking out into a nervous sweat over it.

 

"Come on, baby," Ember sing-songs as she steps around the stiff ghost-boy, tuning her guitar with one hand and waving off a manager or something with the other. "We've been practicing for a long time for this show – how bad could it be?"

 

"Um," Danny says cattily, ignoring the way Ember was already rolling her eyes at his attitude. "I practiced for a _single week_ just so that you wouldn't send out _blackmail_ to the _entire human breaching Ghost Zone._ I would hardly call this 'prepared." His gaze snaps to her with a flash of green. "Plus, you call Walker _'granddad'_ and get away with it. What the hell?"

 

Ember scoffs at his flimsy change of topic and apparent comfort tactic as she bends over, her flaming ponytail coming much too close to singeing Danny's face. "Listen – the fact that I can't get my fans the way that _I want to,"_ her hair flares slightly, reminding a stagnant Danny that they used to be enemies, "is already a boon." She straightens and heads towards the ghostly human disguised band at the center of the covered stage. "Besides – you'll have a lot more to worry about than a single video of you fumbling around on a rod after this world broadcast is over."

 

Danny resists the urge to ecto-blast her in the back as he stands up straight and tugs slightly at his outfit with nervous hands. His getup is simple – black shorts and a white flowy crop top with a fluorescent aqua music note on it.

 

Despite its simplicity, it's actually quite deceiving, and he was forced to practice the dance routine for the past week in this specific costume only. He knows by now that if he isn't careful, he could get caught in the expensive (very, _very_ expensive) material and make a blunder.

 

At that thought, his heart begins to race again. Was he really doing this? Was his life really like this?

 

 _And to think._ Danny moves automatically at the call for their places, honed in by a week straight of near sleepless and restless repetition that he scowls bitterly at. _Sam and Tucker are going to be in the crowd. Oh, and whoever just happens to be watching television tonight._

 

_Which is everyone._

 

_Awesome._

 

Danny's going to throw up.

 

"Chin up, baby-pop!" Ember calls from her place at the front of the stage where the curtain is about to be pulled aside. "It's not all that bad; you'll see!"

 

Danny makes a few not-nice gestures at her open back. The other dancers don't even flinch from their trained positions, more than accustomed to 'the little spitfire's less than grateful or polite ways. He also made sure that, within a couple of hours on the first day, every one knew that he was being blackmailed into the performance.

 

Needless to say, as these were all professional dancers who had probably fought tooth and nail to get where they are today, he wasn't a very popular person.

 

He also really doesn't care.

 

Like the breath whooshing out of a person's lungs right before shooting to kill, the curtain begins to rise and let in blinding light and the cacophony of near deafening cheers from the crowd.

 

Danny's mind shifts into a place that he didn't know up until a few months ago when he first started using his body for more than just fighting and self-hate.

 

He puts his best foot forward and begins to dance.

.


End file.
